The sound split the room like a scream. Michelle’s gaze locked on the phone. On the bomb.
It began to vibrate. Oh shit… She looked into Malcolm’s eyes.
A buzzer sounded.
No explosion. No flash. Just a sharp click.
On the blasting cap.
Malcolm was grinning. He lifted the disengaged cap he’d been holding. “I told you, baby. No juice, no boost. So what’d you think? I think it drives just fine.”
Michelle’s body relaxed. Inside, she was screaming. She wanted to punch Malcolm in the face. But she was too spent. Sweat was pouring through her T-shirt.
Malcolm took the blasting cap and wheeled the chair back over to the device. “You think I was gonna set this beauty off?” He shook his head. “Fat chance, baby. She’s got important work to do. This bomb is going to blow the minds of everybody in San Francisco.”
Chapter 31
ABOUT SEVEN, I was back at my desk. My teams scattered all around the area, chasing the leads we had. Cindy had gotten me a copy of this book, Vampire Capitalism. She said it would give me an idea of the new radicalism that was starting to take hold.
I flipped through the chapter headings: “The Failure of Capitalism.” “Economic Apartheid.” “Vampire Economics.” “The Armageddon of Greed.”
I didn’t even notice Jill standing at my door. She knocked, making me jump. “If only John Ashcroft could see you. The linchpin of the city’s law-enforcement machine… Vampire Capitalism?”
“Required reading,” I said, smiling, embarrassed, “for the serial killer with a bang.”
She was dressed in a stylish red pantsuit and a Burberry summer raincoat, a pile of briefs squeezed into her leather satchel. “I figured you could use a drink.”
“I could,” I said, tapping the book against the desk, “but I’m still on duty.” I offered her a bag of Szechuan soybeans instead.
“What are you doing,” she snickered, “heading up the department’s new Subversive Authors wing?”
“Very cute,” I said. “Here’s a fact I bet you didn’t know. Bill Gates, Paul Allen, and Warren Buffett made more money last year than the thirty poorest countries, a quarter of the world’s population.”
Jill smiled. “It’s good to see you developing a social consciousness, given your line of work.”
“There’s something bothering me, Jill. The fake secondary device outside Lightower’s town house. The note on the company form balled up in Bengosian’s mouth. These people have made their motive clear. But they’re trying to taunt us. Why play the game?”
She balanced a red shoe on the edge of my desk. “I don’t know. You’re the one who catches ’em, honey. I just put ’em away.”
There was a bit of a pause. A stiff one. “You mind if I change the subject?”
“Your soybeans,” she said with a shrug, popping one in her mouth.
“I don’t know if this’ll sound silly. I was a little worried the other day. Sunday. After we ran. Those marks, Jill. On your arms. Something got me thinking.”
“Thinking about what?” she asked.
I looked into her eyes. “I know you didn’t get those marks from a shower door. I know what it’s like, Jill, when you have to admit you’re human, like the rest of us. I know how you wanted that baby. Then your dad died. I know you pretend that you can work everything out. But maybe you can’t sometimes. You won’t talk about it with anyone, even us. So the answer is, I don’t know about those marks. You tell me.”
There was a stubbornness in her eyes that suddenly turned fragile, something about to give. I didn’t know if I had gone too far, but to hell with it, she was my friend. All I wanted was for her to be happy.
“Maybe you’re right about one thing,” Jill finally said. “Maybe those marks didn’t come from a shower door.”
Chapter 32
THERE ARE CRIMES that are brutal and inexcusable. Sometimes they make me sick, but their motives are open. Now and then, I even understand. Then there are the hidden crimes. The ones you are never meant to see. The kind of cruelty that barely breaks the skin but crushes what’s inside, the little voice that is human in all of us.
These are the ones that really make me wonder about what I do for a living.